


Wanting Infinitely

by CapConspicuous



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: !!!fun, Anxious Katsuki Yuuri, Canon Compliant, Feelings, Growing Up, M/M, Self Confidence Issues, Yuri on Ice - Freeform, insecurites, yuuri figuring out what he wants
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-03
Updated: 2017-01-03
Packaged: 2018-09-14 09:25:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9173521
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CapConspicuous/pseuds/CapConspicuous
Summary: Yuuri Katsuki realized in the distant, abstract way many five-year-olds realized things, that he wantedthat. He wanted to go fast, wanted to spin in circles as well, and he could not go for a minute longer standing static on solid ground.Aka. Yuuri grew up on ice and so he has wanted many things.





	

**Author's Note:**

> X3 just... some fun writing. I love Yuuri and will protect him with my life, the end, you can go home now, that's all I have to say.
> 
> KUDOS. COMMENTS. (who are they??? I don't know them)

Yuuri Katsuki discovered ice skating by accident. During his fifth winter, he and his parents visited a farmers market, only to find that a temporary skating rink had been set up between the hand-crafted goods and the snack stands. 

Five-year-old Yuuri, with a skewered piece of fried squid in his hands, watched the figures gliding over the ice. He watched them laugh, saw some stumble, loved the speed at which they spun in circles. 

Yuuri Katsuki realized in the distant, abstract way many five-year-olds realized things, that he wanted _that_. He wanted to go fast, wanted to spin in circles as well, and he could not go for a minute longer standing static on solid ground.

It did not take much begging or persuading before his parents were agreeing to his eager request, and he was lifted atop a table while a stranger strapped bulky shoes to his tiny feet. A bright red band was stuck around his wrist, and he tugged at it absently- then they set him back on the ground again- and he could not walk.

Balancing with skates on was a perilous thing, he would tilt this way and that and this way again- until his mother took one hand and his father took the other- so they made their way onto the rink like that, Yuuri nearly suspended between his laughing parents, teetering precariously on blades.

It was not a monumental moment when Yuuri first set a tremulous foot onto that sheet of ice- there was no slow motion or beautiful realization; both his hands were firmly grasped and so he was able to stand on the ice with little movement. He did not fall, but he gasped at the view, being so close to the skaters now whooshing past. At this, he felt the idea again- he wanted that speed and the cold puffs of breath to fly past his face. He saw the minute glistening of the ice and he wanted to see it blur underneath him- well, at least it was this sort of revelation, somewhat.

Yuuri wanted to go fast. That's all that mattered. So maybe the glittering of the freezing surface did not truly catch his eye- he just wanted to feel the frigidness slide past him. The way any child enjoyed sticking their hand out the window the feel the wind push against them- this was what Yuuri wanted.

When his parents let go tentatively, that was when Yuuri fell. 

But Yuuri Katsuki was a rotund, happy little boy of five, and a little tumble onto the shockingly cold ice only illicited startled peals of laughter. 

So his parents helped him up, brushed some ice off his jacket front and out of his hair, then let him stand. He braced himself on the cold border of the rink, and took one slide-step forward before losing his balance again.

There were many startled laughs that day and little speed, but Yuuri wanted that _fast-ness_ so very much, so who were his parents to deny him that?

They returned to the rink nearly every day on Yuuri's insistence, until the market closed up for the season- Yuuri had become familiar with the cold bringing pink to his face and ice underneath his palms when he struggled to get up again and he could now shuffle forward with some dependability and less staggering about. Later, Yuuri would look back on the videos of him inching along the ice with a deep, concave-chested fondness, distantly recalling the need for speed that little-Yuuri had possessed.

Yes, Yuuri was sad to see the rink go, until his mother promised him his very own skating lessons at Ice Castle Hasetsu, if that was what he wanted- and yes, that was what Yuuri wanted, _yes_ -

And Yuuri learned with the other children his age how to skate, not shuffle, he became accustomed to the scrape of ice against his skates, the cold, clean trails that the blades made behind him, the rhythm of sliding ice against metal- or was it metal against ice?

He found friends in Yuuko and Takeshi just as he found exhilaration from the ice, and later he found an idol in Viktor Nikiforov the way he found wonder in being swift.

So Yuuri found that speed he was craving- and he did so with the joy of a child when he skated as fast as he could for as long as he could, not caring particularly about where he was going, only that he would continue his loops round the rink with his highest possible tempo, to compete with his racing pulse.

\---

Competitive skating was an entirely different realm for Yuuri Katsuki, age fifteen. It was the world inside a glass ball, where the snowflakes fell when you tilted it upside down and the little people inside looked pretty and flawless- until Yuuri was in that world, suddenly, abruptly, scarily- and the snow fell without his control and the glass distorted the view of outside and he realized that they wanted _him_ to look pretty-

And Yuuri Katsuki came to realize that looking pretty was not simple at all. His jumps were a bit awkward; his limbs splayed out confusingly and his movements bled into each other messily. Watching his own step sequences, it was jarringly obvious how gangly he was, how jerky some of his movements were at the wrong times.

It wasn't to say that he was terrible- that was far from the truth. But now Yuuri saw that the only way to improve was through beauty and he desperately needed it. He craved the grace with which Viktor Nikiforov flew over the ice, hair a blinding flash, outfit a stunning impression. 

Figure skating was a performance sport. People watched and expected to be amazed. Their eyes traced the act unfolding on the ice, and _Yuuri_ needed to be that art. 

Yuuri knew he would remain stagnant without the impeccable step sequences and perfect tension required for jumps- deliberate movements that were precise but never calculated and the flow from one thread of action to another-

And Yuuri spent many nights, after one competition or another, in the hot springs by himself. He would lean his head back against the stone, letting steam wash over him and shut his imperfect eyes. 

When the water was near-scalding, it was easy to ignore the unevenness his felt in his body. It was easy to forget his fumbling movements or clumsy stride.

Sometimes Yuuri imagined that he would rise from the spring anew, water glistening like the ash off a phoenix's feathers, and he would be light-footed and graceful and sure of everything from the bat of his eyelashes to the twitch of a finger. 

Sometimes Yuuri hated everything about himself, sitting there in the hot spring uselessly. His fingers were too spindly and his knees were too knobbly and honestly, he hated his toes.

Sometimes Yuuri just sat there and forgot everything but the gentle rush of water and immersed himself in warmth.

Sometimes Yuuri sat with his head in his hands, silently berating himself to practice more because if he didn't have that innate beauty he had to _work_ toward it and he _knew that_. He could make up for what he lacked, he could build from the ground up, with hours and hours of practice and mindless movement. And bruised feet and raw knees and jammed pinky finger from touching down on the ice too hard meant nothing in the face of something greater, something Yuuri needed.

Yes, there were difficult nights like that. Nights when Yuuri was forced to accept that he, Yuuri Katsuki, was not a magical, perfectly beautiful being, and that he might never be that flawless, breath-taking creature on the ice.

But there were also nights when Yuuri slid across the ice like it was made for him, because years of practice had finally shone through and he was able to bring that light outside. Years from fifteen, now, but he still craved that beauty- only, every time he tilted his head back or spun or caught ice crystals on his skates, he grew closer to that image of perfection that he chased. Like double vision finally lining up to form a flawless vision of Yuuri at last.

It's a sweet type of triumph when he pulls himself down and in for a flying sit spin and he knows that the audience is watching and that they are holding on to bated breaths. 

It's a perfect picture of suspended pride when Yuuri's flashing blades and his riveting step sequence cause people to gasp aloud.

It's a happiness that Yuuri can feel buzzing at his fingertips when he realizes that he has achieved that beauty and perfect execution that fifteen-year-old Yuuri grasped and fumbled for, and that the beautiful wrecks and pits of misery that he had braved and tumbled headfirst into on his way back to the top only served to fill him with the fire that captivates those watching.

These are the nights that Yuuri remembers, alongside lone nights at the freezing rink and spent in boiling springs. These nights of splendor- _Yuuri's_ splendor and finally being able to bask in it.

\---

There are always random moments of sudden and heart-stopping nature when Yuuri realizes just how long he has been on the ice. Maybe a little bit of mental counting, just in the back compartment of his mind, and he comes up with a number- nineteen.

Nineteen years on frozen water, different skates, different emotions, different needs.

The want for speed, the need for beauty, and even perhaps the dark time somewhere in the mix where the only thing Yuuri had wanted was just not-skating.

Yuuri Katsuki looks into Viktor's eyes and he knows what he wants next.

He has been on the ice for so long- Viktor even longer- and now in the spiraling magenta and royal blue glow of the lights around them, Yuuri finds that he never wants this to end.

Yuuri loves this too much for it to be over. He couldn't bear the lights to shut off because the two of them look so beautiful, _too beautiful_ , painted in vivid voilet hues. He lives for the continuous song of blades on ice, ice on the blades, throwing glimmers of white crystals into the air when Viktor lifts him into the crisp atmosphere.

Yuuri wants an eternity on ice, hand lingering in Viktor's so they stay just the right amount of close, eyes meeting across a perfect expanse that feels anything but empty.

Yuuri needs this to last forever, a millennium squared, because Viktor hasn't taken his eyes off him for one second and their movements in tandem with each other is the most beautiful art of all.

The leaping of his heart and the reverberations of ice up his body and his exhilarated laugh at Viktor's content smile should never, ever come to a stop.

If everything on ice is love, then _this_ is the love that Yuuri Katsuki wants, with Viktor. 

And he wants it infinitely.

**Author's Note:**

> This was an attempt at canon compliance hahahHAAHAHA .... .-.
> 
> @harlivyHQ or @capconspicious (for Stucky, primarily)  
> <33333 Love to the fandom! HMU, I also art sometimes.


End file.
